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PEOPLE v. LEWIS.†
Defendant was charged, in an amended information, with contributing to the delinquency of a minor, a misdemeanor. Said defendant entered a plea of guilty to the charge, and, his application for probation being denied, was sentenced to imprisonment in the county jail for a period of two years. This appeal is from the judgment and the sentence.
Appellant contends that the “sentence imposed was in excess of the time as prescribed by law, and was therefore contrary to the law.”
The offense of contributing to the delinquency of a minor, which is, by section 21 of the Juvenile Court Act (Act 3966, Deering's Gen.Laws) declared to be a misdemeanor, provides as a maximum punishment, “a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars, or by imprisonment in the county jail for not more than two years, or by both such fine and imprisonment.” Appellant, however, relies upon section 19a of the Penal Code, enacted subsequently, St.1933, p. 2217, which provides that “In no case shall any person sentenced to confinement in a county or city jail on conviction of misdemeanor, or as a condition of probation, or for any reason, be committed for a period in excess of one year. If, however, any county, or group of counties together, should establish a penal farm, or if there be established a State institution for long–term misdemeanants, then commitment to such penal farms or such State institutions shall be for such period as the court may order within the limits prescribed by statute for the offense.”
Respondent asserts, in substance, that said section 19a is unconstitutional and void for the reason that the maximum period of confinement prescribed therein is not fixed and definite under all circumstances; that it does not fix the same maximum punishment for the same offense throughout the state; that the State Constitution provides that “All laws of a general nature shall have a uniform operation,” section 11, art. 1; and that said Constitution further provides that “The legislature shall not pass local or special laws * * * for the punishment of crimes and misdemeanors,” and shall not pass local or special laws “In all other cases where a general law can be made applicable,” section 25, art. 4.
Respondent's contention must be sustained. Obviously that portion of section 19a of the Penal Code providing for a different punishment in counties where a penal farm is established is repugnant to the Constitution. Such provision is neither general in nature nor uniform in operation; to the contrary, it not only lacks those essentials, but is conditional and therefore indefinite. It not only permits but actually creates a different punishment for the same offense. Inasmuch as the limitation of one year is provisional and conditional and clearly intended to operate, if valid, subject to the condition therein provided, the invalidity of the condition, as above pointed out, necessarily invalidates the limitation. It is elementary that the courts will not annul, as contrary to the Constitution, a statute unless it can be said of the statute that it clearly and certainly is opposed to the Constitution. If there is doubt, it is the general rule that the will of the Legislature will be sustained. But when a definite and substantial conflict with the Constitution appears, that it is the court's plain duty to condemn the statute, requires no citation of authority. For the foregoing reasons it is evident that the provisions of section 19a of the Penal Code, above quoted, are invalid, and that, therefore, the judgment pronounced conforms to the law.
The judgment appealed from is affirmed. Since no appeal lies from a sentence, the attempted appeal therefrom is dismissed.
DORAN, Justice.
We concur: YORK, P. J.; WHITE, J.
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Docket No: Cr. 3038.
Decided: March 09, 1938
Court: District Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 1, California.
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